Before
by Jewelz1
Summary: MOULIN ROUGE FIC...long before Christian, Satine was a 14 year old, abandoned, x-aristocrat named Anna Marie Saint, working for an abusive constable for food and board. Eventually, she finds herself in the famed Moulin Rouge as a cortesan, struggling betw
1. Default Chapter

Before   
By: Jewelz  
  
Anna Marie Saint had been typing for almost fifteen hours straight, having started at 6:35 a.m. The chipped coo-coo clock on the wall now read 9:20, but the numbing pain in Anna's fingers told her much longer. Sitting neatly beside her 1880 typewriter was an enormous stack of type-written police reports, Anna's single triumph of the never ending day.   
She picked up a sheet of yellowing paper that lay in an equally large stack opposite the first. Squinting into the fading candlelight, Anna strained to make out the first sentence.   
Jonas Parkson, rapist, murderer, and owner of stolen goods.  
Or did it say,  
Thomas Rakesom, rapist , murderer, and owner of taken foods ?  
  
Constable Peter Arabb was the reason she struggled to make out the writing on the page. The day before, Anna had asked him to please not use cursive when writing the police reports as it was harder to read than if he just printed. It was the last time she ever asked him for anything……slowly, as though forcing herself to look, she glance down her arm at the fresh red scar that ran straight from her wrist to her right elbow.   
Trying hard to blink back the tears, Anna slowly began to pack up her things for the night in a leather suitcase her sister had given to Anna before she had left home for the Moulin Rouge. She could still hear her sister, begging Anna to come too….  
*  
"Please Annie, there is nothing you can do! Mother is dying and not even your vigilant nursing will save her. Now it is our turn to seek how to survive! "  
  
"but the Moulin Rouge Katherine! It is not fit for a lady, it is disgracing ! we were raised as aristocrats; I am ashamed that you would even think to put such dishonor on our whole family!"  
  
"disgrace keeps me alive Anna Marie, especially in times like this. If our father can keep his honor and still walk out on the Saint family, than so can I by going on living"   
  
"Well then Katherine, I suggest you start right now. You have my answer. I will stay here and be with mother until- until the end."  
  
"and then?"…………………………  
*  
Anna had not been able to answer her sister's last question. It had ended with Katherine Saint fixing a brand-new suitcase as well as twenty dollars into Anna's hand, and then, avoiding her sister's stunned gaze, fleeing out the door and into the pouring rain, for a life of dishonesty at the famed Paris night club, The Moulin Rouge.  
  
Anna headed for the door, taking the tiny stub of a candle with her.   
Angry footsteps sounded from down the hall, growing louder and louder all too quickly.  
Before Anna's hand had reached the brass doorknob, the pounded open, causing the candle to go out, and Anna to be thrown on the ground. An enormous, terrifying figure loomed in the hallway. Constable Arabb wheezed loudly over her, filling the deadly silence  
Anna let out a sound much like a whimper. The constable took a heavy step forward  
"girl!" he growled "where are those reports"   
Anna stammered, "right o-over th-there sir, not all finished sir but I can-"  
"WHAT!!!!" he bellowed, flecks of spit coming flying from gruesome teeth "HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I-"  
"I'm sorry sir!!!" Anna pleaded with an unknown courage inside her. "Tommorrow, tomorrow!! "  
"I DON'T WANT ANY MORE EXCUSES!!" he yelled " last you got a mighty cut from a whiskey bottle. Now I want you too stay right here and finish ALL the reports tonight. And you know what the next punishment will be??????"   
Anna shook her head between loud sobs   
"You, Anna Marie Saint, will have a little visit to my bed!!"   
The door slammed again, Angry footsteps were heard again growing fainter, and he was gone.  
Anna Marie sat at her small desk and wept and wept in the dark, knowing that the time had come to escape to the Moulin Rouge.  
  
  



	2. escape

The lights danced and spun in a blur of colors:  
reds, greens, blues, and glittering golds, twirling around and around the wooden window frames and doors. The spectacular of the Moulin Rouge even out-shined the stars, which were dotted cleanly throughout the evening sky.  
A small girl clad in fine, but very old and worn clothing, and carrying a wool carpetbag, was illuminated like a silver statue by the pouring light from the building before her.   
Blaring noise and music filled her ears from inside. A heart-stopping fear flooded through the girls body, as she made her way to the door, ready to open up into a knew way of life.  
  
What she didn't know, was that a twenty~four year old showgirl with long, flowing hair that blended with the night sky was peering around a corner at this curious child that looked to be a wealthy aristocrat's daughter.  
"Wait!" the experienced courtesan shouted into the night. The young girl looked startled and her face quickly drained of colour.  
A dog barked in the distance.  
The tall, dark haired woman before the 14 year old girl cat-walked over to her, dressed in a black corset, black lace skirt that swished around her knees, fishnet stockings, and high, black boots.   
The small girl shivered.  
' are you all right my dear?' The courtesan asked in a kindly voice.   
The girls face, illuminated in white from the moon, nodded vigorously.  
"I think so' she answered  
" you will need to be getting home to your parents, dear, they will worry about you at this time of night, and the Moulin Rouge is not a place for a young girl like you."  
  
The child turned away to stare at the pavement.   
" my parents are dead' she said simply. Though her father was still alive, he had been dead a long time to her. "I want to be a courtesan at the Moulin Rouge."  
  
The showgirl was taken aback, intrigued by the child's simple story. She did not know what to say. The girl was pure and nieve. She didn't know, she just didn't know the expenses of being a courtesan, or what it would be like, what she'd be forced to do for money…  
  
"I'm Claira' The older courtesan said softly.   
The silence that followed was endless. The sounds of the Moulin Rouge echoed into the black night.  
  
"and your name is?' The courtesan asked finally  
"Anna Marie Saint' came the reply, proper and crisp  
  
'no…' Claira whispered slowly.  
  
"now it is Satine, the title of a showgirl, courtesan, and dancer"   
  
Claira took her hand and led the girl to a secret back door at the side of the club, far away from the glamorous glitter of a night club.  
Satine followed, making a deep hollow sound against the paved street with her shoes, and thinking of just how unfitting the name would be.  
  
  
  



End file.
